Chapter Text
I don't wanna fade into the darkness tonight (Show me the light)
I don't wanna be the one to fall on the knife (To come alive)
I'm about to be there, I'm about to be there,
Watch me, I swear
I'll dance in the shadow of a man!- Lady Gaga, Shadow of a Man
On this day, 19 years ago, her father jumped down the skyscraper where he was working, unable to stay tied to an office chair after a lifetime spent on the stage of his dreams.
On this same day, 3 years ago, she danced on the lifeless body of her mother, shadows swirling around her like a carousel.
And also on this day, last year, she got out of prison.
Poe wondered if something was going to happen before the clock ticked midnight, thus ending the day.
Sure, she was walking around the empty streets of the Greenwich Village with the talking ghost of a basset hound, but that wasn't really a peculiar event anymore.
She's been taking out Bats for the last six months almost every night, as her magical mentor Clea Strange spent the evenings in search of her husband among the stars and didn't want to be bothered.
Clea didn't want Poe to operate as a hero on Earth just yet, except for very very rare missions together, and she preferred to train her in other dimensions or mystical grounds, so all she could do on Earth so far was taking Bats out for his walkies and some housekeeping in the Sanctum.
“And… Do you see that name everywhere now?” Bats, the ghost dog, asked her while floating a few steps ahead.
Poe scanned her surroundings, looking carefully at the shadows.
“Not really, no… It appears here and there.”
“It's weird though, seeing the shadows spelling a name… you should've told Clea.”
“Yeah, I know.” Poe sighed, lowering the volume in her earphones.
“Usually it's you who moves the shadows around.” Bats made a pirouette mid-air, looking back at her.
“You know I'm still not sure of the nature of my powers, I can control the shadows but… Dunno, maybe they're trying to tell me something. Maybe I should just look up who that might be on the Internet.”
“You didn't?”
Poe shrugged. Her mind had been more distracted than usual near this anniversary, focus had never been her forte, and she procrastinated the research.
“There's not much signal in the Sanctum, honestly.”
Help Reynolds.
Reynolds wasn't a rare name or surname, really, but she didn't know anyone with that name, maybe a couple of actors. Poe had wondered what it meant, but mostly why the shadows every now and then showed her those words, spelling it out on the floors and walls of the Sanctum Sanctorum out of her control, but small enough to be just in her range of sight.
Was it an order or a call for help?
Hopefully, given the eventful date, tonight she was going to get her answers.
Suddenly a noise erupted from a dark alley nearby, as if someone just bumped very hard into something hollow and metallic.
Poe rushed towards the corner, and saw a man in his mid 30s leaning against a dumpster, grunting in pain. There wasn't much light around, but it was enough to show her the most blue eyes she's ever seen under a curtain of dirty, hazel curls. Eyes full of fear and exhaustion, as the man was trying to run from something and it seems he had been doing so for days, maybe weeks.
“Leave me alone, please-” he huffed, stumbling to his feet and falling next to the dumpster.
“You'll never get rid of me, you know it.” Another voice replied, stirring Poe's guts. It was dark, deep, like coming directly from beneath the earth.
Hiding behind the corner, she kneeled down to face Bats.
“Go back to the Sanctum.”
“But-”
“I'll be back soon, I promise. I'll call Clea if I need to.”
Without further questions and trusting Poe's skills, Bats floated away rapidly.
“We're back to the gutter where we belong, Bob, aren't you happy? This is what you deserve, you always ruin everything anyway!”
The deep voice rumbled again and Poe looked back in the alley, seeing the man trying to make himself smaller with a whimper, but not the source of that voice. Those words made her blood boil, and she moved instinctively.
“Hey, you've heard him. Leave him alone!”
She stood in the alley, now openly facing whoever was threatening that homeless man.
Another man, made of complete darkness.
A shadow, standing still like a silhouette, who turned around to face her. Two small dots of barely visible light were his eyes, and a few red markings swirled inside his figure like blood in the water.
“And who are you, pretty girl?” As the shadow chuckled, the man on the ground sent Poe a soul-piercing stare, his fear -if possible- completely taking over.
“No! No, go away! Void-” He tried to scream at her, but the shadow man kicked him right in the guts.
“Shut up, Reynolds! She looks delightfully killable. More blood on your hands, yes.”
After a quick glance, the shadow-man dashed forward and Poe instinctively turned on her earphones, ready to fight.
‘Well, this might really be my lucky night.’ She thought.
Apparently she just found out who Reynolds was, and her enemy seemed made of the same substance she could bend at her will.
Moving quickly in tune with the upbeat music, Poe twirled around and dodged the creature, then gathered all the darkness in the alley behind her to create sharp blades at her sides. Right now, her only worry was in case the shadow-man had her same powers.
Another step, and her blades rained on him.
Her test gave a result she was expecting, he was immune to her shadows, but surprisingly he wasn't absorbing nor controlling them, he simply got pushed back on a hit.
“What the fuck is this?” He blurted out, confused. He seemed taken aback by someone standing his ground, and rather offended.
“Please, just… just run away!” Behind her, the homeless man was trying to stand up with no success, but Poe got the impression that he also wanted to defend her from his enemy.
“You can't hurt me, sweetie. You can't run away.” The shadow growled, walking menacingly towards her while the music blasted in one of her ears.
She got an idea.
He walked closer, to much distress for the other man, and when the boogeyman was less than a step from her, she smirked.
“You're just a shadow.”
A well focused gesture of her hand was enough to get him by surprise and completely paralyse him on his tracks, then she sent him flying backwards: Poe found out that while he retained his conscience, she could control his body, made of darkness, forcing him away from her. She pinned him down on the ground.
“No! I'm the Void, you can't control or defeat me, I'll always come back! I'll kill you!”
“As I said, you're just a shadow, and shadows are mine. Now, get out of my sight.” A flick of the wrist, and she shoved his entire figure against a lamppost, making him vanish within the light.
“How… how did you do that?” The homeless man let out a surprised sigh and she immediately turned to check on him, still unable to stand up.
“My name is Sidney Poe, and as you saw, I can manipulate darkness.” She said with a smile, and he stared at her eyes with a curious expression that wasn't new to her, given the bright yellow color of her irises.
“He's not just a shadow, though… he is the Void and he was right, he will come back… as long as I'm alive. I'm… sorry.”
He looked down, defeated, scared.
Haunted.
Tiredness was getting a hold on him, weighing on his lean shoulders and Poe felt her heart squeezing at this poor man cursed by a relentless shadow, she couldn't leave him here. If not her, maybe Clea's magic could do something.
“You must be Reynolds, right?”
Without raising his head, he nodded weakly, almost ashamed of his name.
“Robert Reynolds, yes. Bob.”
“I want to help you, Bob, can I?”
She reached her hand out, but Bob was too exhausted to reply, and fainted on her lap.